Twins....seperating them at school help.

alijolly

I have worked in three schools one was too small for this to be an issue but in the other two twins being separated or not was dealt with individually. The parents views were given a lot of value. In one year group we had three sets of twins, two pairs were taught in the same class and one pair were separated at the request of the parents.

I would certainly discuss your concerns with the school and ask if they have any reasons, apart from school policy, for keeping them apart. I feel they should be doing what is best for the individual children not sticking rigidly to policy in a case like this

Kez100

Can't help with everything but can I just say my daughter started pulling her eyelashes and fringe hair out when in year 3 - so not much older. Can I say a calm approach to dealing with the stresses (in her case academic work) and approaching calmly ways she could stop her hair pulling really helped and she recovered from it very quickly. Nipped in the bud you could say.

Things we did was show her -using a magnifying glass how well she was doing to regrow the hairs. Even tonight that can be done because they grow and can't be plucked until a certain length anyway, so she will have some there now. I used to ask each morning if she had problems the night before or had been successful. I never got annoyed if she had gone back a step - just said lets look tonight and see if any are growing - and repeated daily, checking each night. I was concerned I might just move her onto doing something else but luckily that wasn't the case with her.


In our case we couldn't avoid the problem - academic work is a necessary evil - so we ensured the school implemented prodcedures to ensure her work was given at the right/or lower level for a while to support her recovery from the stress she was clearly feeling.

bunty109

You said that your son is the dominant twin so I would assume the school have noticed this and are trying to help make your daughter more independent by placing her in another class. In the schools my children are in it is usual practise to separate twins as the norm as it is felt to give them a more individual identity.

However, this is obviously causing your daughter some distress. I think maybe you need to see your GP as fabwitch suggests and then speak to the Head about this. As a school governor, my advice would be to ask the Head for help. Don't ask for your daughter to be put with her brother in the first instance; ask for strategies to be put in place to help your daughter as she's struggling with the separation.

Not quite the same but my son was separated from his 3 best friends. It's a long story, but basically came down to their dependency on one another rather than anything else. He was fine up until a couple of weeks ago when he started to have issues at school. He got very upset one day and I was really distressed. His teacher and the Head were great and talked to him and his friends and sorted the problems out. He's fine being away from them in class as he still sees them so much out of school and at playtime, and I have to admit that I feel (and have always felt) that he's working harder and more independently on his own. He's also got a lot more friends that he would otherwise have.

I know it's hard and you probably want to demand your daughter is placed with her brother, but I think that maybe this can be handled without resorting to that; at least not in the first instance.

Good luck!

bestpud

I think the biggest issue here (in terms of them being in different classes) is you not being informed about the split in advance. Perhaps your dd would have coped better had she been properly prepared for it?

I guess the school would say you should know, as it is their policy, but if they started out together...?

Your dd sounds pretty distressed to me and I would take her to your GP. If putting them back together is the answer for her, and the school object, then your GP could prove invaluable.

There is plenty of time for them to develop independence later on. If one of them is suffering (and it seems your dd is) then I can see no justification in keeping them apart at this stage in their schooling.

I hope the head is more sympathetic than he sounds when you have the meeting with him!

ka7e

My primary conferred with parents of twins as to whether they were schooled together or not.

My boy/girl twins were separated in Reception, at my request. My daughter was very outgoing and confident and tended to "look after" her "quieter" brother. In fact, he was only quiet and timid in nursery/school, at home he was a little tornado!

I thought it would give him more confidence to be on his own - it never did. But my daughter benefited from not having to fend for him, I think he would have held her back socially and academically.

They are now 19 and the differences between them are as marked as ever. But they are still as close as can be!

Spendless

pulliptears wrote: »

They have the rest of their lives to function alone, at 5 the priority should be healthy happy children.

I have never known a school take this stance.

There are loads of multiples in my kids schools, including twins, triplets and quads. They have all been in different classes since at least yr 1, and sometimes from reception.

luvvlyjubbly

The thing is i have given it a go, since September. We got a new head this time last year and this is his policy....they haven't looked at my twins and decided it was beneficial.
The first I knew of the split was the day i went back in September and they were both clearly distraught and I felt terrible leaving them and to be honest I was fuming.
I don't want to come across at school as a demanding mum and have tried to see if it will work....up until DD starting hair pulling I would've left it....but why all this greif for a simple solution.
Twins have a special unique bond that only a parent of twins would really understand....I don't mean that to sound ignorant....and in the same breathe they are as individual as the rest of us...
I'm waffling now...!!!
DD teacher has said she's doing well with her work, but really is schooling all about how well they do? Isn't a childs well-being just as important?

bestpud

luvvlyjubbly wrote: »

DD teacher has said she's doing well with her work, but really is schooling all about how well they do? Isn't a childs well-being just as important?

I think so, yes. Or it should be!

I also think you should have been informed about it before the school broke up for summer.

When children are moved around, it is the norm to tell them, and their parents, in advance. Or they have certainly done that when my children have had class shake ups.

You should not feel you are being overly anxious here - your dd is pulling her eyebrows out! She is clearly distressed and that needs addressing.

pboae

I can see both sides of this, I agree that it cannot be healthy for her to be so stressed at such a young age, but equally it's not healthy for her to be insecure either.

It might get worse if it isn't dealt with early on. If you force the school to put them together this year, what about next year, and the year after?

Why not speak to the school with an open mind, explain what you are seeing and listen to their views on it. They will probably have seen it all before.

Maybe between you you can find a way to help her overcome this. They may be more willing to compromise this year, if you can agree a plan to encourage their independence more gradually and work on building her confidence so they can be split more successfully later on. But just insisting that they are schooled together, does nothing to help the underlying issue.

ALIBOBSY

These must be big primary schools, or maybe I live in too rural an area lol. All the local primaries round here only have one class in each year (dds and dss school only has around 120 pupils). My dd reception class only has 28 in it. Twins would (and do) stay together all through infants and juniors. Even our local secondary schools only have around 700 pupils.
Personnally I would be annoyed at the headmaster for dismissing your concerns so quickly. See your GP and then the headmaster again. At the end of the day the school can recommend things but they are your children, trust your instincts mums know best.
good luck
ali x